


A Heartbeat's Enough

by heartstarmagick



Category: Final Fantasy VII, The Magicians (TV)
Genre: (that sweet sweet retcon), Everything is Beautiful and Nothing Hurts, Fix-It, Fluff and Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Retcon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-21
Updated: 2019-04-21
Packaged: 2020-01-23 14:59:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 567
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18552121
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/heartstarmagick/pseuds/heartstarmagick
Summary: S4 finale fix-it. Aerith helps Quentin get to where he really needs to be.





	A Heartbeat's Enough

**Author's Note:**

  * Translation into Русский available: [A Heartbeat's Enough](https://archiveofourown.org/works/19766194) by [WinteryFox](https://archiveofourown.org/users/WinteryFox/pseuds/WinteryFox)



> To say the finale devastated me would be undercutting it. I felt compelled to give Quentin the ending he deserves and couldn't get the ending of Advent Children out of my head for some reason, so I knew what needed to be done. Title swiped from the song Loss by (our favorites) Phoria. 
> 
> Starring my favorite being made of love & light, Aerith Gainsborough, aka the biggest Queliot shipper of all time. 
> 
> Dedicated with so very much love to everyone in this fandom who's mourning. I hope the pain eases soon & I hope this can bring some comfort ♥

Quentin’s not exactly sure what he expects from death, but it’s not quite this.

All he can see is bright white, like a light. It feels way too cliché.

There’s a presence behind him, it almost feels like they’re back to back. He’s dreamy and a little disoriented, but the feeling of tightness and anxiousness in his chest hasn’t gone away like he’s expected it to.

“Penny?”

“No,” he can’t see her but he knows that she’s smiling.

Quentin doesn’t recognize her voice. He expects her to elaborate but she doesn’t. “Who are you?”

“You can call me Aerith.” Her voice is soft, sweet, on the edge of melodic.

“Aerith.” Normally he’d find her lack of forthcoming-ness off putting but right now it’s like he’s filled with a warmth and calm he doesn’t expect.  

“You remind me of someone. An old friend,” she says, gently touching his wrist. Quentin looks down and notices flowers blooming at their feet, overtaking some of the vast white space around them. “He was brave, just like you.”

“What am I doing here?”

“You’re here because you’re brave,” she says, “but you’ll move on when you realize where you need to go.” Aerith says it like she knows something, like she’s so, very sure.

Quentin’s about to ask what that’s even supposed to mean when it hits him like a fucking freight train. “I think I made a mistake,” he verbalizes, his voice broken and far away from him. He bites his lip and all he can see in his mind’s eye is Eliot’s face at that campfire; Eliot more destroyed than Quentin had ever seen him.

The flowers bloom rich yellows and blues and reds as he _cries_. Aerith takes his hand, her voice as kind as ever, “It takes strength to admit when we’ve done something wrong, Quentin.”

“I-I didn’t want this to be—how it ended for me…”

“It doesn’t have to be.”

Everything inside of him stops and he’s completely, totally _stunned_  as his mysterious shepherd turns so she’s standing beside him. Before he can say anything, she gracefully raises her left hand and with a flourish, something materializes in front of them.

“Now you know where you need to go.”

Quentin immediately recognizes it as the door to their cottage in Fillory. Fifty years—he’d know it anywhere.

Part of him can’t shake the feeling that it’s a trick though, that this is actually the door to hell or something and he hesitates. Aerith, maybe the gentlest being he’s ever come across, puts a warm hand on his shoulder. “He’s waiting for you, whenever you’re ready.”

Something in him just _knows_  that she’s talking about Eliot and not the devil, not his father—living, real, _Eliot_. 

“I don’t think I deserve this,” he says softly.

“Says who?” They both know the answer. “You’ve earned a happy ending, Quentin. He has too, don’t you think?”

He nods stiffly, almost shaking. Aerith smiles again, “Brave boy.”

Then just like that she’s gone, and it’s just Quentin walking through the achingly familiar door.

The door takes him to a living room. Eliot’s on the couch, looking like he just finished crying, big eyes welling with tears the second they fall on Quentin. “A-am I hallucinating?”

Quentin just smiles and goes to the couch, taking his hand and placing it on his chest, “If you were, how would asking me help?”


End file.
